Quinoa Salad with Black Beans and Avocado

Quinoa Salad with Black Beans and Avocado

What a whirlwind of a weekend. Thursday marked the first of the month, also marking a large milestone in the life of me and Mr. Henderson. We moved into our first apartment! Granted, we have been living together for the past three months, but I don't think we can really count the Redstone Apartments as "ours".

As I'm sitting in our glorious studio loft, sipping my nightly cup of Mint Magic tea, watching Beerfest on our newly purchased 42" TV, I have to say I am truly content.  Our place is amazing, mi amor is done with his crazy schedule (for now at least) and we just had a delightfully delicious quinoa salad for dinner.  Now onto the food.

One of our weekly rituals is "Meatless Monday". Each Monday, we cook a new vegetarian dinner, experimenting with different forms of protein and seeing what we can come up with to counterbalance our generally meat-filled diet. This week was inspired by our beloved neighbor down south, Mexico!

Delightful quinoa salad worthy of any Latin food lover.

For this citrus filled, gloriously light salad, you will need:

• 1 cup dry quinoa
• 1 15oz can of black beans (drained and rinsed)
• 1 ripe avocado
• 3 tbsp chopped cilantro
• 1 quart of cherry tomatoes (quartered)
• The juice of 2 limes
• Salt & pepper to taste

Bring 2 cups of water to boil. Add the quinoa and turn down to simmer, letting it cook for 8 - 10 minutes.Chop the avocado. My trick? Quarter it, slice it lengthwise, then across so it comes out in small chunks. Leave the rind on so you can easily slide it into your salad when you're ready.

Once the quinoa is done cooking, turn it down to low and add the beans. Mix together and let the beans get warm.

Transfer the quinoa and bean mix to a large bowl and add the rest of the ingredients. Toss together with a wooden spoon (gently of course) and you're ready to eat!

Serve hot, warm, or chilled - your choice! This dish is scrumptious any which way you please. You can even add shrimp on top (like Matt who clearly was not into Meatless Monday this week...oh well it's still healthy!)

Sauteed Shrimp pack even more protein into this healthy quinoa salad.